{"id":2046,"date":"2017-02-20T07:30:06","date_gmt":"2017-02-20T12:30:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/?p=2046"},"modified":"2017-02-20T07:30:06","modified_gmt":"2017-02-20T12:30:06","slug":"i-do-belief-help-my-unbelief","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/i-do-belief-help-my-unbelief\/","title":{"rendered":"I Do Belief, Help My Unbelief"},"content":{"rendered":"

In today’s Gospel (February 20, 2017)<\/a>\u00a0we hear the story of Jesus driving out another evil spirit. \u00a0He has does this before but this time there is a difference.<\/p>\n

Before coming to Jesus directly, the boy’s father had asked Jesus to drive out the evil spirit but they were unable to do. \u00a0Why? \u00a0Jesus replies, “This kind can only come out through prayer<\/em>.” \u00a0I’ve always struggled with this as it sounds like his disciples weren’t praying. \u00a0How else can any human expect to drive out an evil spirit except through prayer to ask God to drive out the evil spirit?<\/p>\n

I looked at the footnotes in the New American Bible Revised Edition<\/em><\/a> and found that it said that Jesus’ reference to prayer signifies a lack of trust or total reliance on God. \u00a0Perhaps the disciples were relying on their own actions rather than God’s help.<\/p>\n

What I really want to get to here is what is what is said in Mark 9:22-24:<\/p>\n

But if you can do anything, have compassion on us and help us.\u201dJesus said to him, \u201c\u2018If you can!\u2019 Everything is possible to one who has faith.\u201dThen the boy\u2019s father cried out, \u201cI do believe, help my unbelief!<\/strong>\u201d<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The man says “if you can.” \u00a0Of course Jesus can do this. \u00a0The man goes on to say “I do believe, help my unbelief.<\/em>” \u00a0We have faith in God but our faith is not always perfect.<\/p>\n

I remember back to shortly after I came back to Church. \u00a0I read a Catholic news story that said the Vatican had just issued a new 400 page manual on exorcisms. \u00a0I was surprised but my surprise was not the length of the manual. \u00a0I was surprised to hear the Church still did exorcisms. \u00a0Wasn’t that just something in horror movies? \u00a0The story said it only happened in rare circumstances so I said okay but figured I won’t ever see one.<\/p>\n

Then fast forward to when I was in seminary. \u00a0I was getting ready for bed and turned the TV on for a few minutes. \u00a0I ended up on a documentary about a family facing an evil possession in their house. \u00a0I was questioning but I kept watching. \u00a0Then I started getting scared. \u00a0I thought I should just turn the TV off and go to sleep. \u00a0I couldn’t. \u00a0I couldn’t change the channel either. \u00a0Freaked out, I just keep watching. \u00a0At the end of the documentary they brought a priest in who did an exorcism and it worked! \u00a0With that, I turned the TV off and fell asleep, completely at ease in faith that God had taken care of it.<\/p>\n

As a priest, I’ve had a couple of occasions where people describe “odd things” happening in their house. \u00a0I explain I am not an exorcist and simply bless their home and it offers them peace and trust in God they need.<\/p>\n

To this day, I am not quite sure what I believe about possession and evil spirits.What I do belief is that God can take care of it. \u00a0You have faith in God, where does your faith fall short? \u00a0What unbelief do you need God to help you with?<\/p>\n

Peace,<\/p>\n

Fr. Jeff<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In today’s Gospel (February 20, 2017)\u00a0we hear the story of Jesus driving out another evil spirit. \u00a0He has does this before but this time there is a difference. Before coming to Jesus directly, the boy’s father had asked Jesus to drive out the evil spirit but they were unable to do. \u00a0Why? \u00a0Jesus replies, “This …<\/p>\n

Continue reading ‘I Do Belief, Help My Unbelief’ »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[1],"tags":[254,253],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pMTPk-x0","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2046"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2046"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2046\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2049,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2046\/revisions\/2049"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2046"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2046"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2046"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}